The Butcher of St Peter's: (Knights Templar 19) (5 page)

Robert shook his head slowly in admiration as John’s voice dropped and he lowered his gaze to stare at them all. A man shifted
his feet on the rushes of the floor, and in the silence all could hear it. They were hanging on John’s words.

‘Because they wanted to steal a body;
that’s
why!’

Arthur was mumbling and snuffling in his sleep, and Cecily was irritated enough to want to smother him with a pillow. God!
Wouldn’t he ever stop that silly noise? Why should a fellow do that so much in the middle of the night, when all about him
people were trying to get some sleep? Perhaps he didn’t realize, but it was the middle of the night.

She should be more patient. Well, yes.
That
was easily said, but when Arthur was snorting and moaning like that, there was little a girl could do about it. And for goodness’
sake, surely she deserved a bit of peace herself? There was no reason why she should be expected to suffer this sort of torment
every night.

She kicked him, gently, to make him stir a little. Usually that worked well enough, but for some reason tonight it didn’t.
So she pinched his arse, good and hard. That did the trick all right!

‘
Ow!
Ow …’ He sniffled to himself and blearily opened his eyes. ‘I was having a horrible dream,’ he said, and wiped his nose
on his sleeve. He always had a runny nose.

‘You,’ Cecily declared, ‘are revolting.’

‘ ’M not,’ her brother said with all the dignity his four and a half years could muster. ‘Mummy says I’m not.’

‘Oh, shut up and go back to sleep. And this time, don’t snore,’ Cecily hissed and threw herself over to face the wall.

Arthur groaned to himself, just like Daddy, and rolled over too, tugging at their shared blankets.

That groaning of his, it was nearly as bad as the snoring and sniffling. He always had a cold, Arthur did, and when he didn’t
he was still grunting and groaning to himself. In Daddy it was endearing, because he was grown up, but a little boy like him,
she thought contemptuously, a little boy like
him
shouldn’t make a noise like that. It was
silly
.

That he was silly was less a subjective judgement than a conviction borne out by the facts. He was clumsy, noisy, rough and
altogether too boisterous. And he was dim. He would believe anything she told him, which made for some amusement for her and
her friends, but it also meant that he was amazingly annoying much of the time. And he had no idea that it was rude to stare.
He would turn his big blue eyes on people and just stare and stare, and it made them uneasy. She’d told him once that if he
kept doing it, someone would come along in the middle of the night and cut out his eyes so he couldn’t be so rude any more,
but it didn’t work. He was more fascinated by the sight of other people than he was terrified by the thought of ghouls and
monsters coming into his chamber at night.

She wasn’t scared, of course. With the perspective that her additional five years gave her, she knew that although ghosts
were all over the place, as her daddy said, they were probably
too scared to come into a house like this with Arthur’s dry nurse about the place. And right, too. Iseult was enough to petrify
even the most scary of ghosts into finding another house.

There was a creak, and Cecily heard a board moving in the chamber overhead. She glanced up, and through the cracks in the
floorboards she caught a flash of blue-white, then another. There was a third, and then a glimmering of yellowish light. Her
father had lit a candle. She kept her eyes open, listening to the soft padding of feet. There was no door to her parents’
room, only an archway which gave onto the staircase. The steps were terribly steep and dangerous, and anyone on them must
clamber cautiously down to the ground. She was aware of whispering and a glow of light, and then her father’s bare legs appeared
as he slowly descended. Once on the ground, she saw him holding a little candle high over his head while he peered about.
He had a sword in his right hand, and his face was black with suspicion. It was an expression that would stay with her for
the rest of her life in her mares: his square, rugged, honest face with an anxious scowl graven upon it.

She made no sound. When Father came down the stairs because of the children’s arguing or playing, he was invariably very cross
and beat them. Tonight he walked near the bed but, to her surprise, although he glanced towards them it was a cursory look,
and then he was crossing the room to the shutters. One was open, and as Cecily watched he pulled it wide and stared out into
the night.

‘Well?’ It was her mother, Juliana, on the stairs.

‘It’s nothing,’ Daniel said. ‘The shutter wasn’t fastened properly. I’ll make it firm now. You go back to bed.’

‘All right, darling. Be quick.’

‘I’ll be there as soon as I can.’

Cecily kept still and waited while he carefully slammed the shutters and slipped a peg over the bar to lock them. Then he
stood surveying the room awhile, before turning and walking out into the hall.

Quietly rolling over, Cecily listened. As usual the clearest sound in the room was her brother’s snuffling and snoring, but
over it she was sure that she could hear her father’s steps in the hall, crossing over the rushes and stopping at the windows
and doors, checking all were shuttered and barred, before returning to the solar. There he locked the door to the hall and
appeared to hesitate.

In the darkness, Cecily heard him muttering, and it was some little while before she made out what he was saying. Then she
realized that he was praying for her and her brother; a quiet, contemplative prayer, as though he was really scared of something
… or someone. ‘Please God, don’t let him hurt them. Not my little darlings.’

It was tempting to call out to him and ask him what he was doing, but Cecily had been thrashed often enough for interrupting
him at night. She knew he disapproved of her waking, even when it was he who had woken her. So instead she remained silent
in the bed, watching and listening as he grunted to himself and made his way back up the stairs to his chamber.

‘Nothing. I told you it was nothing. Go to sleep,’ she heard him say in response to a mumbled, sleepy enquiry from her mother,
and then Cecily heard him tumble into their bed again. There was a squeaking of ropes as the mattress took his weight, and
then the boards moved again, and in the thin light of the candle upstairs she saw a fine dust falling gently.

‘Why were you so long, then?’

‘I feared there might be a man there, that’s all.’

‘Est?’ Cecily could hear that her mother was wide awake now. ‘He’s no threat, is he?’

‘No.’

‘So why the sword?’

He made no answer for a while. Then, ‘Go to sleep. We can discuss this tomorrow.’

Cecily waited for the candle to be blown out, but for once her father did not heed his own stern injunction that all candles
should be extinguished when the family was in bed. She was asleep before long, and her last memory was of the thin beam of
light projecting between the floorboards.

‘Why do you hate him so?’ Jeanne asked again. ‘You loathed him at Tiverton, because he was so keen on politicking and took
no account of the impact of his actions on other people, but he seems a better man now he is no longer at the castle.’

‘You think so?’ Baldwin asked. He was sitting in front of a polished copper plate while Edgar ran a razor over his cheeks.
It was not the best time to be discussing the finer points of his feelings for Sir Peregrine.

‘I know it seems irrational, my love, and that isn’t natural for you.’

Baldwin was silent awhile as he considered this. Jeanne’s question had annoyed him, although not for the petty reason that
many believed a woman should accept her man’s decisions without question. Baldwin respected his wife as well as loving her,
and he had married her for her independence and intelligence. He had no use for a slave. But her question had reminded him
that he had chosen to detest Sir Peregrine a long time ago when they first met and Sir Peregrine tried to enlist his support
for rebellion against the Despensers and the King; this was no mere irrational dislike. He waited until Edgar was finished,
and then, with his face freshly rinsed and towelled, he stood,
wincing slightly at the pain in his breast where the bolt had struck, and took her hand.

‘My sweet, I don’t think it is in him to change, any more than a dappled pony can become a chestnut. No, he is a dangerous
person to know, and dangerous to talk to. At any time there could be another war, and I will not tie myself to a band which
seeks to overthrow the King.’

‘You can’t believe he’d dare to seek that!’ she exclaimed with a smile, but there was no reciprocal amusement on his face.
‘Do you?’

He nodded. ‘It may seem far-fetched, but that is exactly what I fear.’

‘Could any man dare such action when the King has just proved his mastery?’ she wondered. ‘It would be rash indeed to attempt
anything against the King or the Despensers.’

‘The Despensers are rich beyond the dreams of any men in the country – any men other than the Despensers,’ Baldwin said quietly.
He disliked speaking of such matters in such a public place, but he needs must persuade Jeanne to be cautious. ‘But their
avarice seems to know no bounds. They take much, but demand still more. Where their greed will end, I cannot tell. However,
I do know that now Mortimer has escaped the Tower, he will become a focus for the disaffected. I would think that a host could
soon be launching itself towards our shores.’

‘War again?’ Jeanne asked.

‘Without a doubt,’ Baldwin said. ‘But this war could be more vicious and damaging even than the last. This time, if Mortimer
gathers an army to him, it will be infinitely worse. The men will have little to lose on either side. All those in Mortimer’s
band will be aware that the King’s revenge will know no limits. If they attack him, he will try to crush them
with the utmost force available to him. And that means that Mortimer will collect the most battle-experienced mercenaries
he can find. If he succeeds and brings men here, and the forces clash … I do not wish to see it.’

In his mind’s eye he could once again see that most appalling battlefield, the fight which had so directed the course of his
life, the culmination of the Siege of Acre in the Holy Land. He had been only seventeen or so, and the sight of the bodies
rotting and desiccating in the streets, while the heads of their comrades were flung over the walls by the ruthless Moors
outside, and the population starved, would never leave him. Even now, the harsh thundering of drums could be enough to make
him break into a sweat if the noise caught him unawares.

‘That man would bring war back to the country. And if the King hears of it, he will take Sir Peregrine and flay him alive
to learn to whom he has spoken. If I appear to support him at all in public or in private, our lives would be at risk,’ Baldwin
said, and thought of their daughter, at home in Furnshill. ‘I will not risk those whom I love for another’s vainglory.’

Reginald was hoping to see her again today. He had been to the market that morning, and while there he’d seen the basket of
oysters. Well, she’d always loved them, hadn’t she? And he was partial to a mess of oysters on a plate himself. It was a lovely
evening, too, and since he would be alone, because his wife had gone off to see her mother in Exmouth, it was the perfect
opportunity to see his lover.

God, but it seemed a long time since he’d last been with her. Over a week, certainly, nearer two. And he was so desperate
to have her. A God-damned miracle she had agreed to meet him again after the last time, the last fiasco. That was awful:
realizing, just as he was getting to the short strokes, that there was someone in his boy’s chamber.

Christ Jesus, seeing that tall figure in the room had near-emasculated him. He’d stood there, staring at the man at the window,
and if he’d had a moment longer to think about it, he’d have shitted himself. The idea that a stranger could be in there with
his son was so terrifying, it near stopped his heart. He’d heard once of a man who was so petrified with terror on finding
felons attempting to rob his house that although he had hidden safely, he had discovered the next morning that his hair had
all turned white! White! As though he had aged forty years in an instant. Well, if that could happen to anyone, it was a miracle
it hadn’t happened to Reg that night, because he would have sworn on his mother’s grave that the presence of the man in there
meant his son was already dead.

Sweet Jesus, the sight of Michael breathing so easily had overwhelmed him. It felt as though God had forgiven him all his
sins in one burst, seeing his lad there safe and sound. He would rather have cut off his own arm than see his son harmed in
any way.

He assumed she would keep their assignation, but perhaps … He’d not been thinking, shouting – well, screaming, really
– for his servants to come and help, then roaring at them to go to the garden. It wasn’t the way to win her over, not when
he’d left her in a steam to go and check on his lad – bellowing for all his men to run through, when any one of them could
have seen her there, tits swinging, trying to pull a blanket over her gorgeous body. It didn’t please her, not at all.

She had her own children. She should have understood what it would feel like to find a man in the room with her son, if she
was in the same boat.

It was her husband he was most scared of, after all.

The weather was about to change. Est could smell it in the air. The unseasonable sunshine which had dried the earth and made
the city smell more of dust than of faeces and blood was going to give way soon to the sort of wind and rain that was more
to be expected. A chill was coming. He could feel it.

He was sitting in the parlour of his little house near the fleshfold, which he had kept more or less as a memorial to his
family. By the door was a hook on which Emma’s favourite apron still hung, as though she had set it there before putting on
her second best for sweeping the floor, and near the fire was the little rough stool he had bought for her from the market.
It had been old widow Marta’s, and he’d snapped it up from Marta’s son when she died. Emma had been pleased with it. Much
more comfortable than her old one.

Her face on the evening when he brought home his little gift was a pleasure to recall. She had always been so happy with so
little. That was fortunate, too, because the year after they were wedded there was not enough money to buy anything much.
It was the hard year when the King’s host was destroyed by the barbarians up north. All killed off in some place called Ballock-something,
or Bannock-whatever. It was no matter to the folk down here, many leagues away. It only meant that there were more taxes for
a while, and some vills were unlucky and had their grain confiscated by the damned Procurers of the King. They’d come round
with their lists of what they wanted, and grab wholesale all the stores which had been intended to keep the folk through the
winter.

Before the fight, he’d even considered leaving Exeter and joining the King’s host, because no one really believed that the
savages up there could do anything against their lawful sovereign. They didn’t call his father the Hammer of the Scots
for nothing, and everyone knew that the new King, Edward II, would bring them to their knees in no time. Except it hadn’t
happened, had it? The Scots had slaughtered the King’s men and sent the few survivors scurrying back. If he’d gone, Est would
have died up there. No one who’d only had a limited experience of fighting with bare fists would have lived to tell the tale.

But he’d stayed, because their lives had already changed. The joy in her face … Emma had sat there, so happy, so content,
as she missed her monthly time in 1313, around the feast of St Andrew, and then started to feel the new life growing in her
womb. So happy. There was so much for them to be pleased about in those days. Except even as she realized that she was carrying
their child, the weather closed in. Rain. Rain for days. Everyone went about complaining, of course, but people always complained
about the weather. Englishmen liked to moan about it all year round. But no one appreciated what
this
weather meant. Sweet Mother of God, how could they? It was rain. In Devonshire they were used to that!

It was not only Devonshire which bore the rain. It was the whole country. Men and women and children watched their crops through
the downpours, and soon after Cissy’s birth in mid-August it was obvious to all that the harvest had failed. And then, when
the grain was gathered, it was useless. No goodness in the little they could collect, and what there was didn’t last long
because it was soon foul. It went black and disgusting. Inedible.

And a short time later prices started to rise. Food which had cost a penny rose to six, seven, even eight pennies. Just at
the time when Emma needed it most, they found that food was growing too expensive for them to buy. Emma left the city each
day to see what she could collect from the hedges, but that
soon grew dangerous. Serfs from the vills disputed the rights of folk from the city to take from the countryside, and fights
started. A man was stabbed in the early August of that year, and Emma was punched and hit across the head by a woman from
a farm near Bishop’s Clyst. Estmund knew her; he’d dealt with her when she had a bullock to sell for market. She’d always
been a pleasant, kindly woman, he’d thought.

There was little money coming in from his butchery, either. No money, no food, and Emma needed all she could get. The Church
had helped at first. Alms were available for the needy, and Emma was plainly that, but soon even the Church had realized that
it couldn’t stave off the hunger of a city on its own. And people started to die.

Emma tried to keep herself cheerful, but how can any young mother be hopeful after finding a corpse in the street? And there
were so many. The elderly simply gave up, sat down and seemed to expire, like heifers struck with the poleaxe. One moment
alive, the next dead. And others fell the same way. Children next, their parents last. No one was safe.

She had tried to keep her sanity. Christ’s bones, everyone had. But when all that is to be seen is the dead, anyone’s mind
is affected. Bodies were everywhere. They said that half the city was dead by the end of it, and how can anybody cope with
that? The cemetery couldn’t, so men, women and children were piled higgledy-piggledy in obscene heaps while the cathedral
paid men to act as assistant fossors, digging pits and shoving in all the dead. Only the rats and the worms lived well.

When their child died, a little over thirteen months after the birth, it killed Emma. She died right then, in front of him.
Her body still moved, her mouth opened and shut, but the light that had gleamed from her eyes … Christ Jesus, she had
been so beautiful, it hurt, it hurt so much to think that she was gone!
Emma just existed for the next two years. Nothing he did would bring her back. She was his own sweeting. The only woman he
had ever loved, and she was snatched from him so cruelly. Just when he needed
her
, she was gone. Perhaps if they’d had more children, it would have given her something to live for, but they only had each
other. And then, two years later, at the time which should have been Cissy’s third birthday, Est came home to find her hanging
from the rafter because she couldn’t bear to live any longer, not without her child.

Why should she live when her baby was dead? She had asked him that often enough, and he never had an answer, except that God
demanded lives when He was ready. Est had to believe that. Otherwise the whole city would have committed suicide just as she
did.

At least Est had found a way to manage his own grief. Even after his darling Emma left him, he still had something he could
do. And he would do it.

Cecily was playing with her rag doll in the yard behind the house when her father came home that day. She cocked her head
to listen as he crashed angrily into the house, and she heard the plates and mugs rattling as he thumped his staff on the
small sideboard and bellowed for wine.

She hunched her shoulders a little. He was cross again. He often was just now. It might mean he’d smack her if she misbehaved,
and she didn’t want that again.

‘Wine! In God’s name what does a man have to do to get a little drink in this place?’

There was a hurried slap of sandalled feet through the hall, and Cecily heard the calmer tones of her mother. ‘What is it,
husband?’

‘Don’t stare at me like that, woman. I’ve been working hard
today, and don’t need your high-and-mighty manner. Fetch me a jug of wine.’

There was a muttered command and Cecily heard more feet. A moment later the maid appeared in the doorway, nodded to Cecily
with a smile, and darted out to the little lean-to shed at the back. She reappeared carrying a leather jug filled with strong
red wine and murmured, ‘Stay out here for a while; just play quietly,’ as she passed.